The High Performance Team

“The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. You may have the greatest bunch of individual stars in the world, but if they don’t play together, the club won’t be worth a dime.”
-Babe Ruth

When it comes to building a high performance team for your business, it helps to think in sports terms. Sports teams are the perfect model for productive businesses – they have rules, goals, the proper equipment, players and coaches.

Anything that is present in a sports game can and should be present in your business. When someone goes out of bounds, the play is over. When someone violates a rule, there is a penalty. When the players are well-coached, well-trained and working together, they will move the ball down the field and score points. The longer and better they work together, the more often they will win.

So how do you use this analogy to build your winning team? Take a look at your business just like it were a team for your favorite sport. Let’s say it’s baseball. Do you have enough players on the field? If not, you need to hire more. Are they the right players? Are they trained to play baseball or tennis? If you’re playing baseball, you need baseball players. Are they getting the coaching they need? Do they have the right equipment? Baseball players don’t need tennis racquets, they need bats. Employees need the right resources to help them produce results. Don’t spend money on a new copier if you really need a new website.

Assessing your company like it is a sports team helps you identify what’s missing, what’s keeping your business from winning. Do you have the right people in the right jobs? Do you have a deep enough bench? Are you coaching them to win or just to get by? Are you giving everyone some playing time? Employees who feel their jobs don’t contribute to the win will not give you their best effort on the field. You need the right players, in the right positions, with the right coach.

Start thinking today about what might be missing in your team playbook. Could your team use some extra coaching? Give us a call and we’ll show you how to turn your players into champions in the world of business.

Are you ready to win?

The Marketing Plan

"The will to win is important, but the will to prepare is vital."

Joe Paterno, Head Football Coach, Penn State University

1. A Marketing Plan is a Map

Having a plan is the first step to getting someplace. If you were lost in a new city the first thing you would do is ask for directions and get a map. You must have a written sales plan that you use every day if you really want to have sales occur in your business.

Without opportunities for sales you will not have sales. It’s that simple. In today’s current market conditions, our strategy is to market ten times more than you ever have before. You must create a plan that includes sales activities that haven’t been happening. (We know it can be intimidating, but when you have a written plan, you can do it!) Networking, calling former clients, building your client database, putting out a newsletter, reworking your web site – all these actions will create opportunities for sales.

The plan must be on paper and it must be shared with everyone in the sales department

2. Action makes something happen

Actions are what make things happen. When we convert an idea into action we move the project forward. Thinking about it, feeling about it and creating a plan without action does not produce results. You need to create accountabilities and ways to keep the projects in existence. Coming up with a good idea and having everybody agree to it is nice, but unless you meet weekly, measure the results and agree on what is going to happen next, the plan will drop out of existence. And that means less sales.

3. Time is required when anything is accomplished

The one thing that is always present when anything happens is a period of time. If you do not block out a period of time to make something happen it will not get done. This is a key ingredient to the success of any plan. Carving out the time in your calendar to make something happen is the only way to insure that it will, in fact, occur.

4. Planning +Action+Time= Results

Planning +Action+Time= Results is the secret formula for making something happen. Implement this strategy, and you will always have success. You are on the right path to winning when all of these ingredients are included in your project. Make sure you play to win by using this strategy now in your marketing plan. Let us know how it works for you.

Are You Ready to Play the Game?